Chapter 51: Prince of Azure and Gold (1/2)

Sinead plops on my comfortable mattress and extends his arms with a satisfied smile.

“That’s my bed!”

“And it saddens me to see it go to waste. Goose feathers, the best one can find in this sad plane.”

I massage the bridge of my nose between two fingers. I should have said no. It was folly to accept this wastrel into my perfectly controlled life. I just need to stay at the top for two more years then I can have justice. What came over me, to risk everything so?

Ah yes, the prison.

“I have so many questions.”

“Ah mortals, so full of those. Always wondering about everything, all the time…”

“And you are any different?”

“Of course,” the Likaean answers with a shiny smile, “what my kind cannot infer will not be answered freely anyway.”

“Yes, well, you will have to indulge this ex-mortal.”

“Of course! I will make some allowance on account of your young age poppet, ask away!”

There are many things I wonder, and one that concerns me greatly.

“Alright, the first and most urgent one. How did you find me?”

I catch the pillow thrown at my head and resist the urge to shred it.

“Oh no no no! Please! You do not receive enough sunlight to afford to be so dim! How could I not know where you are?!”

What, is he tracking me? Wait… Oh. My hand goes to my collar, under which my two keepsakes are hidden. The first is the promissory note to my father that I would outlive him. The promise may be fulfilled, but the emotion and meaning in that yellow piece of paper remain.

The second is my emergency dose of Likaean blood in an enchanted silver canister, granted by the most insufferable creature this side of reality.

“You can really track this little blood?”

“This is my most precious of essence we are talking about here, you commoner!”

“Most precious!? If my observations are correct, you have been spreading 'essence' around with utmost abandon!”

“Psh! Beautiful women should never be vulgar, poppet. It is beneath you.”

“You give me lessons even though you have the impudence of… of… oh, the audacity!”

“While beneath me, you will find dear Louisa Watson.”

“Sinead!”

“I am already bored, how can you blame me if I feel cranky, I ask? Why is there no proper liquor in your bedroom anyway?”

I take a deep breath. The familiar gesture calms me, just like the belief that my location is still secure.

“I am abstinent.”

Sinead’s eyes flash in amusement and for a moment they shine with a golden color that poets dream of.

“That you are, though not entirely. I can tell that you know how to have a bit of fun.”

If I could still blush, I would. I usually manage to keep a certain distance from my employees and their patrons. The mysterious aura works in my favor when I need to feed or to avoid unwanted attention and so far, I have not found someone that I would be willing to take to my bed. As Debbie would put it, the odds are good, but the goods are odd. Not so with Sinead. He somehow managed to get under my skin in only two days. I have lost my composure more times since he deposited that first envelope than during the past three years together.

“Your imagination is truly a wild and impetuous thing.”

“Is it?” he answers with a smug smile, then reveals a book I had on my night table from behind him, opens it at a random page and reads in a falsetto voice.

“Oh lord Alejandro, I can wait no longer. I beg thee, sheathe thyself…”

“GIVE IT BACK THIS INSTANT!”

The uncouth rogue does not resist as I grab my… ahem, relaxation book and put it back where it belongs. So embarrassing.

“Would it not be nice?”

I turn around to face him. He is just standing there, looking awfully suspicious by not doing anything.

“What?”

“To have someone who knows you and appreciates you for who you truly are? Someone mature and skilled you could depend on?”

When did he get so close?

“Would it not be nice to finally let go in the arms of a man you could have loved?”

His perfume is tantalizing. Seeing him again makes me miss Loth, Isaac, Dalton… I am so alone here, surrounded at all times by employees and cattle but not friends. I cannot bring someone in my confidence here, for how could I? How could I share what worries me with a mortal without sending them screaming to the nearest church? And I cannot expect anything valuable from cattle whose sole purpose is to please me.

The mortals are at it downstairs, and in the city around, night after night. Being merry. Embracing each other. Whispering things about love. Making it. Sinead is insufferable, and I would not trust myself with him, but perhaps just a kiss? To see what it’s like after waiting so long? What would be the harm? I should have had a kiss from someone brilliant and fetching for so long. I deserve it. I deserve to have someone take care of me, for a change. Sinead is witty, elegant and experienced, and he could charm the undergarments off a nun. Probably did it too, at some point. Perhaps I should try it.

I lean forward and at the same moment, Sinead steps away.

“Alas, it cannot be me. Not as crippled as I am now anyway. I could not stand to be the weaker partner, and you could not resist the temptation.”

Huh?

“You are such a tease!”

“Not so poppet, merely trying to help you. You are still too afraid. You need to be in control but when you are, you only stay where you feel safe. It would take an older vampire with might, a delicate touch and genuine feelings playing a balancing act to crack your shell from the outside. I am merely trying to help you get out of your egg by yourself.”

“You are the very soul of kindness.”

“I know.”

“Hold on… I had questions! How did we ever get so sidetracked!?”

“Apologies dearie. Ask away, and be quick about it. I need to sample the bar downstairs.”

“Not so fast. Second question, how come I cannot smell you or detect your aura?”

“Without giving away precious details, know that I have found a way to contain my munificence to match your dreary world. As for the aura, surely you know they can be controlled, yes?”

“Hum. I know they can expand or retract, to match our mood?”

“Pfeh! You speak as if knowing when the tide comes is the same as controlling the sea. Child, I am talking about aura control. Control!”

“But, yours has disappeared! It’s completely gone!”

Sinead gazes at me as if I were the village dullard.

“I am prince of the Likaeans Ariane, why would I have anything but perfect mastery over myself?”

“It did not prevent you from being captured…” I grumble.

“True! You have to understand, however, that the very concept of having to hide was new to me. Not everyone can match your ability to scurry around and survive against all odds, poppet.”

I frown.

“I think there must have been a vague insult here somewhere.”

“Whatever do you mean? How can I not admire your tenacity? Your uncanny skill at avoiding the foot of the mighty stomping down on you?”

“I am not a cockroach! And stop trying to distract me. How did you ever come here? I thought you were in South America.”

“Loth sent me to central America poppet, however I did not stay there. I have conducted a discreet enquiry that led me here, to the order of Gabriel’s prison. I want your help dismantling it.”

“And in return?”

“Why, I shall grace your humble halls with my presence of course!”

Silence spreads in the room as I cross my arms in exasperation.

“I do believe I have been more than generous in any dealing I ever had with you Sinead. You are abusing my kindness.”

“And on top of that, I shall grant you favors, yes!”

Favors. Sinead has no money, no influence over those who matter to me. What he does have is knowledge, and for us, knowledge is priceless.

“How old are you anyway?”

“Oh my dear poppet, I am so glad to finally interest you as a person. Know that time flows erratically in the kingdoms. It should come as no surprise then, that I may not give you a satisfactory answer. Just know that compared to us, your civilization is in its infant stage, and I am using civilization in its broadest sense here.”

Sinead’s eyes shine like gold and his face twists with savagery. In an instant, the affable trickster melts away and I can see the Prince beneath. I remember the figure in my dream more than twenty years ago, with hair of fire and eyes of molten metal. With a wave of his hand, he had sent azure flames to engulf the shadows hounding me, vaporizing them in a single instant. I know in my soul that they are the same person. The balance of power between us now is a grotesque reversal of what it could be, no, what it would be, in his native reality. Unaware or uncaring, Sinead continues his speech.

“All of us caught here and used as batteries for your kind represent a library of Alexandria’s worth of knowledge. Some have written pieces of poetry so beautiful that lesser beings have lost their lives hearing it. Others, sculptures and visual works so mesmerizing that one can admire them for centuries without ever growing jaded. They could make statues cry and yet here their voices are silenced, and their fingers broken by the basest of greed. There are no words in your coarse language, no insult dire enough to give justice to this tragedy, Ariane of the Nirari.”

I am struck before the incandescent display and just as he is done, the moment passes. He is back to being just Sinead the witty and rakishly handsome socialite.

“But let us change topic. I fear I may be a tad sensitive over this particular issue, it relates to my utmost desire you see.”

“Your utmost desire? What is it?”

“Why, nothing less than the complete liberation of every Likaean on this plane and their safe return back to the kingdoms.”

I almost sputter at the enormity of it. Complete liberation? Poppycock.

“Do you have any idea…”

“I have excellent ideas poppet, about everything. And you shall play a role.”

The Likaeans are incredible assets for the clans who own them. To forcefully liberate them on a large scale would force a war between the conspirators and the whole of vampiredom. Loth estimates our number at a bit over two thousand in total. Even if only one in twenty is a lord, that still represents enough power to defeat any force on the planet. I saw what Lord Suarez could do. To stand against a hundred like him is folly. Pure insanity.

“You are mad Sinead. I should give up on you and drink you dry before another one does it.”

“You should, Devourer, and yet you will not.”

I glare at him with all the outrage I can muster.

“I wouldn’t be so sure.”

“Oh I am sure, I would not have survived and stayed prince if I were not an excellent judge of character. You have a cruel and violent streak in you, but it is always tempered by a profound sense of justice and honor. Is it not?”

“I wouldn’t say that…”

“You did not punish your cattle in anger for allowing me entry, because they could do nothing and so were not at fault. Many vampires would have made an example. You did not break the spirit of the agreement between us to drink my blood while I was weak, yet you could have. You faced the Herald, though you did not have to, and you killed it.”

Sinead approaches. He moves gracefully, like a dancer, not a predator like me. I find myself staring up in his too large iris. He slowly lifts a finger up to my exposed collarbone and touches my bare skin. The contact is intimate yet restrained. Respectful.

“I choose you as my knight in this endeavor for it is what you are. You will help me because I will make it worth your while, but mostly you will help me because I will stand for what you believe in, the right to exist and to be free.”

He almost got me there.

“You have a grand vision Sinead but you seem to forget. We are not Prince and Knight. We are two fugitives in a box of wood painted gold at the back end of nowhere. There are hundreds of vampires who can snap my neck in an instant and they are the ones we would have to face.”

“Not if my plan succeeds, and for this, I need one of the prisoners we will liberate soon.”

“Who?”

“My fiancée, Princess Sivaya of the Court of Blue.”

Oh, great now there is another one.

“Hum Sinead, I am not exactly aware of Likaean courtship customs…”

“It is considered an excellent omen if the husband has already fathered several bastards with lesser beings. Twenty is best, though the standing record is at six hundred and forty-seven known offsprings.”

I have absolutely no idea what to do with this information.

“Oh but do not worry, I do not intend to break it. So… Was there anything else?”

“Yes! Stop trying to distract me. The prize for my assistance.”

“And what would you ask?”

I open my mouth to speak then stop. Sinead looks like a teacher with a predictable student. He expects me to ask something.